Paus Benedictus XVI – geboren Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger – ziet euthanasie, abortus en het homohuwelijk als zware bedreigingen voor de vrede. Dat schrijft Ratzinger in zijn pamflet ‘Gezegend zijn de vredestichters’ dat vrijdag verspreid werd door het Vaticaan in het kader van de Werelddag van de Vrede. “Iedereen die van vrede houdt mag aanvallen op het leven niet tolereren.”
Enkele hoogtepunten uit zijn pamflet, voor het gemak in het Engels:
“Anyone who loves peace cannot tolerate attacks and crimes against life. Those who insufficiently value human life and, in consequence, support among other things the liberalization of abortion, perhaps do not realize that in this way they are proposing the pursuit ofa false peace. The flight from responsibility, which degrades human persons, and even more so the killingof a defenceless and innocent being, will never be able to produce happiness or peace.”
“There is also a need to acknowledge and promote the natural structure of marriage as the union of a man and a woman in the face of attempts to makeit juridically equivalent to radically different types of union; such attempts actually harm and help to destabilize marriage, obscuring its specific nature and its indispensable role in society.These principles are not truths of faith, nor are they simply a corollary of the right to religious freedom.They are inscribed in human nature itself, accessible to reason and thus common to all humanity.The Church’s efforts to promote them are not therefore confessional in character, but addressed to all people, whatever their religious affi liation.”
“Consequently, another important way of helping to build peace is for legal systems and the administration of justice to recognize the right to invokethe principle of conscientious objection in the face of laws or government measures that offend against human dignity, such as abortion and euthanasia.”
Met de groetjes uit het Vaticaan.
